Pros:
- Some dope wordplay:
"I'll split every pound of your body into sixpence."
About optimisim: "I'll rip the electrons out of your body and make you positive"- Wicked rhyming, e.g.
"Every time I speak my mind I'm lyrically critical
The pinnacle of being revolutionarily pivotal
Beyond anything ever studied that's metaphysical
Man fuck a minority, I'm not politically minimal
But obviously terminologies that are statistical
are manufactured to be unequivically subliminal"
- The mammoth track Dance with the Devil needs a special mention: a shocking and grimy 6 and-a-half-minute narrative followed by a dope bonus track containing lyrical gems such as:
"Beneath the surface, I'm overheating your receiving circuits
by unleashing deeper verses than priests speak in churches
what ya preach is worthless, your worship defeats the purpose
like President Bush taking bullets for the secret service"
and
"[I'm ruthless, I...] show no cumpassion, like having a straight-faced orgasm"
and
"you're less than nothing, I just had to get this stress "off my chest", like breast reduction"
- Truth-telling through lyrical dopeness:
"I remember hip hop before the mic gun-clappers
Cause I used to drink forties with more flavor than these rappers
Lyrical ego trip doesn't make fortification
You're not dope enough, to spit self glorification
So don't jerk me around cause my name ain't masturbation
...
To be emancipated start debating justice in the cipher
Why do you think project rooms look like the cells in Riker's
I'm explaining the significance or the reason behind it
They're preparing your children for the prison environment
When you don't amount to shit prison becomes retirement"
- IT just spits his rhymes so crisply, you can feel the energy and focus in every line, there's none of the laid-back over-relaxed Snoop Dogg-style rhyming
- This is pure, raw rap. You won't find any poppy beats, watered-down lyrics or opinions or R&B singers on the hooks.
Cons/Other points:
- The message of the songs is not always as well-defined as on Volume 2.
- The production on some tracks is not as polished as on Volume 2.
- Tracks 7 and 15 have annoying beats that make me skip them every time
- Tracks 5, 8, 10 and 13 are skits, although 5 is pretty funny and track 8 is an interesting and thought-provoking monologue
- The above leaves approximately 10 good tracks out of 16 in my mind, but those are generally dope
Summary - For true hip-hops fans, I'd say this is almost a must-have. Not recommended for fans of poppy or commercial rap. If you're a true rap fan it's pretty dope overall, but IT was just getting warmed up. Falls slightly short of the quality of Volume 2, due to some annoying beats and some slightly less topically focussed lyrics. If you already have Volume 2, and liked it, buy this. If you have neither, buy Volume 2 first.
